In the Middle East, Turkey seeks to play a key role if and when the Iran conflict winds down. Ankara will seek to grow its influence as Iran’s influence declines.

Turkey is positioning itself to play a key role when the Iran conflict winds down. The conflict has led to chaos in the region, and it remains to be seen if the US and Israel can come up with a strategy to deal with Iran or what comes next.

Turkey is also thinking of its next steps. Not involving itself in the conflict enables Ankara to work with both sides.

Turkey is a NATO ally and has also had amicable ties with Iran in the past.

It also plays a key role in Syria and in northern Iraq. Turkey’s Director of the National Intelligence Organization (MIT) İbrahim Kalin delivered important remarks at the Stratcom Summit this week.

Some were clipped for videos that appeared online. Kalin has been a key member of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s team over the years. The Stratcom summit focused on “Disruption in the International System: Crises, Narratives, and Search for Order.”

This can be seen through the lens of the Iran conflict and other conflicts.

Kalin noted that since the pandemic, the world has been passing through multiple critical thresholds, crises, and ruptures, according to a Turkish readout of his speech.

The Russia-Ukraine War is one feature of the crisis. The conflicts in Gaza and Iran are others.

“The 12-day Israel-Iran War that took place in June last year bore a character that both tested and revealed the actual conditions of the conflict we are currently facing,” he said, adding that Ankara tried to prevent the current Iran war from breaking out.

“On every occasion, we have underlined that a global system grounded in unpredictability, fragility, and the arbitrary use of power can only generate further crises and wars, and we have made every effort to prevent such conflicts and destruction.

“Today, as we stand in the midst of this war, we have been making intensive efforts over the past month both to bring it to an end and to ensure that Turkey remains outside this conflict.”

Turkey sees Israel as culprit in regional war

Turkey wants to prevent the Iran conflict from spreading. Ankara sees Israel as a key culprit in the wars in the region. This includes Israel’s current war with Hezbollah in Lebanon, in which more than a million people have been displaced.

Ankara has positioned itself as one of the main critics of Israel’s policies over the years. It has supported Gaza and hosted Hamas. Back in 2010, it also enabled a flotilla, led by the Mavi Marmara, to sail toward Gaza.

This resulted in an Israeli raid on the ship in which 10 Turkish citizens were killed. Turkey-Israel ties have been in a downward spiral since that incident and the 2009 war in Gaza. There was a brief warming of ties in 2022, but that quickly faded with the recent war in Gaza.

Ankara’s foreign policy has shifted in the last two years. It has moved from being more aggressive in the region, including frequent controversies with Greece and Egypt, as well as public battles with Saudi Arabia and the UAE, to reconciliation.

These days, Turkey has excellent ties with Saudi Arabia and has also patched things up with Egypt. It also works with Pakistan and other Muslim countries.

As such, Turkey has returned to the AKP party's “zero problems” roots, which dominated foreign policy from 2003 to 2014. The Syrian civil war, the rise of ISIS, and battles with the PKK, as well as a coup attempt in Turkey, have led to radicalization in foreign policy.

Kalin described the war in Iran as an example of regional “fitna” or discord.

This reference will be considered important among Muslims. Ankara is arguing that the war in Iran is an attempt to divide the Islamic countries and the Islamic community, or ummah.

It is worth noting that Kalin speaks in Islamic terms to an audience that understands his references. He is not speaking for a Western audience. This matters because the translation of his speech may seem more banal when he speaks about “discord.”

He says, “I must also underline that a great fire of discord [fitna] is being ignited in our region,” adding that the war is “laying the groundwork for a fratricidal conflict – a prolonged cycle of hostility among the region’s founding peoples, namely Turks, Kurds, Arabs, and Persians, that could endure for decades.

“As Turkey, I would like to stress that we will remain on full alert and resolutely counter such attempts.”
Ankara is arguing, or at least insinuating, that Israel’s decision to go to war with Iran and the US’s decision to join the conflict may result in new civil conflicts in the region.

This comes at a time when the region was moving toward stability in the wake of the ISIS war, which ended in 2019, and the tragic Israel-Hamas War, which began with the Hamas attack in 2023 but had led to a ceasefire in 2025.

The ceasefire was followed by an immediate drive for war with Iran. Turkey sees this as incredibly damaging for the Middle East.

“However, we are fully aware that those who initiated this war do not intend to limit it to Iran alone. Through faits accomplis in Lebanon, Syria, the Palestinian territories, and elsewhere, they seek to create new realities on the ground and pursue policies of destruction, annexation, and occupation,” Kalin said.

He also referenced the changes on the border between Syria and Israel, in which Israel used the fall of the Assad regime as an opportunity to seize the peak of Mount Hermon, as well as some areas along the buffer zone of the 1974 ceasefire lines.

Israel claims this is merely defensive in order to preempt threats. Ankara sees it as a kind of expansionist policy that is linked to Israel also seeking to seize part of southern Lebanon and half of Gaza as a buffer.

Ankara’s complaints in this regard may be ironic. Turkey itself has made huge claims to its Mediterranean “Blue Homeland,” where it seeks to assert control over a swath of the East Mediterranean through a deal it signed with Libya.

Ankara has sent troops into Syria since 2016 and also has troops in northern Iraq’s Kurdistan Region.

Turkey says it is fighting terrorism. Israel says it is fighting terrorism.

Turkey’s government has become more religious and right-wing, as has Israel’s. In many ways, the countries share policies. Kalin’s argument is that today Ankara is seeking to be a peaceful steward of the region, and Israel is like a proverbial bull in a china shop.

“In all our engagements and consultations with our friends and brotherly countries in the Gulf, we emphasize the need to pursue an approach grounded in the region’s own dynamics in order to bring this war to an end as soon as possible,” Kalin said.

“While the attacks carried out by Iran against Gulf countries are undoubtedly unacceptable, we must never lose sight of who initiated this war.

“Therefore, pressure must be increased on Israel, and efforts must be concentrated on the actor that started the war in order to prevent it from escalating into a broader regional conflict and a global crisis,” he continued.

Turkey seeks to “manage” what comes next as it coordinates with regional countries. “In light of these lessons, we are strengthening our country’s security architecture and enhancing our resilience.”

Like Israel, Turkey has a strong defense industrial complex. It wants to position itself as a leader in an increasingly multi-polar world. Kalin’s speech is part of this drive for a new world order.

Of particular interest, the statement about his speech says that “Kalin stated that, since the 1970s, postmodernist thinkers have argued that the era of grand narratives – such as reason, science, enlightenment, progress, religion, and society – has come to an end, suggesting instead that the course of humanity would continue through more micro-level relations and histories centered on identity, gender, ethnicity, and social classes.”

This shows that Ankara’s views are not just about the region but also about wider global trends.

“None of these has made the world more rational, freer, or more just. On the contrary, we have entered a darker period in which irrational, darker, and anti-freedom forces have come to the fore – almost confirming Freud’s projections about the subconscious. We have reached a point where some now refer to this as a ‘dark enlightenment.’”

Kalin went on to say, referencing our digital age, that “the mere production of information is not sufficient for humanity to achieve its goals. Knowledge alone is not enough; knowing is not enough – we must also possess wisdom.”

Turkey, he said, “in the face of postmodernism’s anti-realist tendencies that deny truth and reality, and against today’s post-truth inclinations, will continue to defend truth.

“Against irrationalism, we will uphold reason grounded in firm foundations; against attempts to enslave reason, we will defend freedom; against mechanization, we will defend the human being; and against dark enlightenment, we will advocate a deeper enlightenment.

“We will insist that these are not relative, arbitrary, contextual, class-based, or political constructs, but absolute, binding, and universal values.”

This drive for truth would typically reflect a conservative normative mindset in the West. As such, Turkey is very much positioning itself as a conservative state in the world order.

In the Middle East, it seeks to play a key role if and when the Iran conflict winds down. It is likely the Iran conflict will lead to years of more crises. Ankara will seek to grow its influence as Iran’s influence declines.